In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life. It goes on. ~ Robert Frost

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Everyone grieves in different ways. For some it could take longer or shorter. I do know it never disappears. An ember still smolders inside me. Most days I don’t notice it. But. Out of the blue it’ll flare to life. ~ Mary V Snyder

I’ve written before about how the body knows, how the mind knows and remembers those horrific instances in your life. I would liken that to a memory foam mattress. How can I compare grief to a mattress? Well, the mattress knows exactly where it fits you, it remembers those angles and curves of your body as your mind remembers the intricacies and pain of grief. And sometimes, or every year or milestone, your body gets right back into that groove because it knows what’s coming.

This year has been on the back of my mind for months. Here we are about to enter the fifth month of 2014 and I have had this niggling thought in my head. What year is it Joanna? 2014. What’s the significance of 2014? Why it would have been mine and Barry’s 15th wedding anniversary. Oh really? So is that why you have felt so uneasy about it? Probably. It’s also probably why I have been quite bitter about this huge milestone. 15 years seems like such a big deal to me, and I am mad that I have to wait another 13.5 years to experience it with husband #2. I always look forward to the milestones. I am jealous of all those people I know that are still happily married after so many years. I had to start over.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am very happily married to the love of my life, and excited to grow old with him. He completes me. And we are madly in love. But I’m still allowed to be bitter about missing these milestones the first time around. Hell, I missed the 10th year by 3 fucking months. Ugh.

So I was watching Call The Midwife tonight, which I just adore by the way. Jenny’s boyfriend falls during a construction job and ultimately dies from an embolism. Cue big crocodile tears. That’s what my husband died from. Watching her fall apart, sobbing because she didn’t get a chance to say goodbye. And then hearing an older woman (WWII Survivor) tell her that she might not think she’s ok now, but she will be one day, and that she had to keep on living until she felt alive again….all that resonated with me. So much so that I wanted to find a quote about grief. I went to google and typed in “quotes about grief”, and wouldn’t you know it, the very first one that popped up was the quote I wrote up above.

How very true. Little thoughts remind me, and sometimes they don’t bother me, but sometimes they set the ember ablaze like tonight. You learn to live with the heartache, it dulls, but a quick knife twist and it’s throbbing again. No woman should ever have to say goodbye to her husband at 29, ever.

I guess grief is what I needed to push me to write again. But since I’m so slow with my writing, don’t expect to see a post for awhile probably. If you get another within a week, count yourselves lucky. I’m going to go nurse my crying hangover with a trip to my bed. This one isn’t a memory foam mattress.

I’m not usually a sappy emotional person when it comes to stuff like that, but I could NOT hold back the tears as I watched them up on that stage. It first started when my daughter’s best friend said her speech for everyone, mentioning how much she would miss my girl. Then when they walked across the stage, I felt tears dripping down my cheeks. I managed to pull myself together, but it was not an easy task.

Every parent gets sad when their children hit certain milestones, as it’s a painful reminder that they are no longer babies, but growing children moving onto bigger and better things. It’s harder for me though, because it is a painful reminder that Barry is no longer with us. It’s hard to stomach that he is missing every.single.major.event in their lives. I cry for them, because they can’t look into the audience and see their daddy watching them, because he won’t be walking the girls down the aisle, because he wont see them graduate high school, college, hold our grandbabies.

It makes my heart hurt that they have to experience all of this without him by their side.

I was told that she had already applied and her application was already approved, she just wanted to come and look at the house before she signed anything. Once she got here, she walked around with the property manager and I could hear how much she liked it, and I was hoping that she’d like it enough to say yes. She LOVED my kitchen.

As she was getting ready to leave, the property manager told me that she was going to take the house, and I got very teary eyed. It was so real to me, knowing someone else would be living in my house and enjoying it while I was gone somewhere in the world. I had to compose myself a bit, and explained to her why it was so hard for me to leave the house, that I was widowed and moved here after my husband died and that I also never expected to leave.

Guess what she told me?

She was widowed last year as well. And she also has four kids, who are around the ages of my kids. And then we both started crying and gave each other a hug.

What are the chances of that?

I am so emotional right now, from realizing it’s really happening, but also because fate really smiled down on me today. I’m not a christian, but I really believe someone was watching out for me today, and brought this really amazing woman to live in our home while I am gone. I feel ok right now, not as worried about someone else being here, and I really really love that a woman in my shoes will be living in this house.

After they stepped out the door, the tears welled out of my eyes and I couldn’t help but let out a ragged sob because of the emotion of today. I had to compose myself before the kids came home, I didn’t feel like answering questions about why I had been crying, but I was able to tell them we had a renter…another widow with four kids.